


Through His Eyes - Levitt & Octavia

by aestheticallyfrogs



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-14
Updated: 2020-11-14
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:54:11
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,444
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27557188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aestheticallyfrogs/pseuds/aestheticallyfrogs
Summary: Basically my take on episode 7x05 told from Levitt's point of view. Canon compliant.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake & Octavia Blake, Octavia Blake & Hope Diyoza, Octavia Blake & Levitt, Octavia Blake/Levitt, POV Levitt





	Through His Eyes - Levitt & Octavia

“We need to know where she came from and how she got there …” Anders was saying, but he trailed of as the girl’s – Octavia’s – eyes snapped open. She immediately started to struggle, her eyes darting around the sterile white room, looking for a way out.

“Hello, Octavia,” Levitt said, trying to keep his voice steady, official. He didn’t want to establish himself as a threat. “We’re going to start by asking you a few baseline questions. Who are you?”

She didn’t answer. Her whole body was tense as she continued to take in her surroundings. Dangerous, Levitt had to remind himself. This girl had fought and killed her way across the compound, something nobody had ever done before. Most would have been captured or killed before they could throw a single punch.

“Mr Levitt asked you a question. Who are you?” Anders surveyed her like a wolf watching his pray. He would have no qualms about ripping Octavia’s sanity apart as long as it got him what he wanted. The thought made Levitt nervous. He’d seen for himself just how ruthless his boss could be, and he silently determined he’d do his best to protect this girl he knew nothing about.

“ _None of your damn business_ ,” She growled. There was no fear in her voice. Whoever this Octavia was, this wasn’t the worst situation she’d ever been in.

Despite herself, Levitt couldn’t help but admire her courage, although he was careful to keep his face a blank mask as she continued to fight against her bonds. “Octavia, please don’t struggle. Memory capture uses the laser guided neural interface. If you’re not careful it could lobotomise you.” He hoped she understood the sincerity of his words. He didn’t want her hurt.

“She doesn’t even understand what that means. Get on with it.” Anders voice was cold.

“Sir, with all due respect, we do things a certain way -”

“What, this is routine then, is that it? Just another standard disciple psych evaluation? We found two seemingly human, clearly dangerous individuals living on our prison planet, how did they get there? How many more of them are there? What do they know about the stones? Ask.” Anders unnaturally pale eyes were fixed on his face, even as Octavia’s panicked breathing filled the room.

He didn’t let a flicker of emotion onto his face as he put on the glasses and strode over to the screen, flicking open Octavia’s mind channel. If he didn’t do this someone else would, and then he wouldn’t be able to protect her at all.

“What are you doing?” She asked, unable to keep the panic out of her voice this time. Levitt didn’t answer.

The lights of her headpiece flashed on and the spike descended down from the ceiling, and those vibrant fiery eyes tracked its movement as she grunted in pain, her jaw clenched.

“There’s nothing to be afraid of as long as you co-operate,” he said, hating the words. He clasped his hands in front of him to stop him from doing something stupid like reaching out to her. He couldn’t do that, not with Ander’s in the room watching and analysing her every move with those pale wolves’ eyes of his. “Let’s try this path. You’re in an endless desert with a vast purple sky. A hand reaches out for your own. Who’s is it?”

She struggled, a small noise of pain escaping her even as images flickered to life on her mind channel, too fast to really identify. People, but nobody who looked like they belonged to Bardo. Who _was_ this girl? Her voice rang out over the flickering pictures: “ _Bellamy!”_

“Good,” Levitt said, pulling the face out of the stream of them, one that seemed to appear more than any of the others. A young man, maybe a few years older than she was, with scruffy dark hair and ragged clothes. Bellamy. Her boyfriend, perhaps? Brother? “Good, the neuro-link is engaged.”

He hated the pain that flickered across her face as she gasped out, “ _go float yourself_.” He didn’t know what that meant, but it sounded like a curse.

Anders’ face was blank of any emotion, but unlike Levitt’s, his wasn’t faked. “Show me.”

“Hologram mode,” he said, and a larger version her mind channel flickered to life in front of him, showing images of the boy, Bellamy. This was who her letter had been to. The letter that had tipped us of to someone being on Penance at all.

“Octavia, who is Bellamy?”

“I’m not giving you anything,” she growled.

The images kept flickering, but not clearly enough to make anything out. She had to have impressive control to be able to block us out this well, but the pain had to be horrible. Memory capture hurt if you didn’t co-operate. “Dial up the frequency,” Anders ordered.

 _No._ “Sir, that could damage -”

“Do it.” His voice brooked no room for argument.

Gritting his teeth, Levitt turned up the frequency. Octavia’s gaze continued to dart about the room, her body rigid and her face contorted with pain.

The voices started, nonsense echoes from her past which she blocked out before they could really form.

“ _Skaikru will not ...”_

_“… algae …”_

_“… are you out of your mind?”_

_“… will not tell_ anyone _…”_

They moved too quickly for him to really make out anything but garbled words here and there, but next to him Anders’ eyes were near glowing.

Her eyes flew wide as she screamed, “ _GET OUT OF MY HEAD_.”

Then she fell into numbing unconsciousness and the images on the screen flickered out.

“Interesting,” Anders said. He looked over to him. “I want you to get those memories. I don’t care what you have to do, or if she’s still functioning by the end of it. I want to know more about the one she calls Clarke Griffin.”

Without another glance at the unconscious girl, Anders turned and strode from the room, leaving him alone with Octavia. Levitt sighed, taking of the glasses and scrubbing at his face with his free hand. What was he going to do?

***

Snippets.

Only snippets of memory made it through her iron self-control and they only lasted seconds before they vanished again, as she tucked them away deep inside herself. It was all still so jumbled he could hardly make head or tail of it. But the snippets that he did see stuck it his head.

Flashes of blood and gore and bodies, of a city sprawling at the foot of a lone tower, of a valley being blasted to ash, of a radiation soaked mountain filled with corpses.

The boy on the screen now – John Murphy – smirked, indifferent. “I’ll survive,” he said. Levitt frowned, dropping the image back into the stream of memories.

“Tell me about this John Murphy,” he said, turning to face her. “Is he family? Friend? Lover?”

As usual, Octavia didn’t respond. Her breathing was laboured, and her eyes remained fixed on a point straight ahead. Her face was shining with sweat. She grunted with effort and the memory channel went dark again.

Levitt sighed, pulling of his glasses to rub his eyes. “We’ve been at this for eleven days, please just let me in.” He could hear the exhaustion in his voice. “If I don’t give Anders something soon they’ll replace me with someone who’ll burn their way right through your head. I’m trying not to do that, okay, I hope by now you can trust me.”

It was true. Whoever followed him wouldn’t care if she were an incoherent wreck by the end of it. He’d been trying not to push too hard, but unless she let him in he couldn’t access her memories without at best causing her inexplicable agony or at worst melting her brain. She was still fighting him.

Octavia was silent, her face set in that steely determination that despite himself he’d come to admire.

Then her laughing voice filled the room, and he turned around, putting the glasses back on to watch the memory that flickered to life.

“ _Hope – Hope, get back here …”_

_A child’s laugh. “Come and get me …”_

He pulled it from her mind channel, and the face of a little girl filled the screen, no more than seven, her brown hair windswept and her grin gap toothed.

_“I did it!”_

The little girl’s – Hope’s – voice was filled with carefree laughter, and he nearly smiled. Then he recognised the trees behind her. “That’s Penance,” Levitt said.

Behind him he saw Octavia’s face harden with concentration.

_“I love you.”_

Then the image vanished, fracturing under his fingers as Octavia pulled it back, panting. “Octavia, stop, just relax,” he said, turning to her.

She didn’t answer, but her mind channel flickered back on. Levitt looked from the girl on the screen to Octavia and back again. “There was a child with you,” he said in wonder. For the first time real fear flared in her eyes. “Who is she? Octavia, if she’s still on Penance -”

Her eyes were squeezed shut. “Skyring, you idiot,” she gasped out. “We call it – Skyring.”

Despite himself, Levitt smiled. Skyring. “I like that,” he said. It was better than Penance, anyway. It made the prison planet sound like a place of freedom rather than punishment. Then a horrible thought occurred to him. “You do know that in the time you’ve been here, years have passed for her.” He tried to keep his voice gentle.

For the first time in days her eyes met his. “You have to let me go,” she whispered, her voice hoarse and scratchy with disuse. “Please. I need to get back to her.” She paused, desperation in every line of her rigid body. “I’m begging you.”

Levitt blinked, the only surprise he could show. But – “I have my orders,” he said, every word bitter on his tongue. “I’m sorry.”

He turned away, opening up her mind channel, unable to look her in the eye as pictures of the little girl filled the screen again.

“I’ll co-operate.”

He glanced back over his shoulder.

“Leave her out of your report and let me go back to her,” she said between laboured breaths. “And I’ll show – everything. Please.”

He hesitated, then dropped the images of the child back into her mind. This way was easier for all three of them, he decided. “Deal.”

“Thank you,” she said.

He strode over to her, looking down into her face expectantly. “Start again.”

She stared back at him defiantly, a half smile twisting her mouth. “Okay, but you’re not gonna like what you see,” she warned.

He didn’t question what she meant by that as he opened up her thought channel and turned up the frequency, preparing himself for whatever was going to come next. Octavia tensed then relaxed as images flickered to life, voices from her past filling the sterile white room.

 _“Bloodreina gave that honour to_ me _!”_

Levitt’s eyes widened as the image changed to Octavia, her face crumpled, and her knuckles stained with someone else’s blood as she choked out, _“You’re dead to me.”_

Then it flickered on, before he could figure out what was happening.

_“You caused the world to be destroyed!”_

_“REDEMPTION!”_

He gasped as the images kept coming, swirling together, and he dared a glance over his shoulder at Octavia. Her eyes were wide and glassy as she stared rigidly out at nothing and he wondered if her refusal to let him in was as much about protecting Hope as it was for herself, so she didn’t have to relive the horrors that she had once endured. Inflicted.

_“I know you’re still trying to save me, Bell. But you can’t save someone who’s already dead.”_

At last the images stopped and focused, and Levitt found himself looking up into the face of a child, a freckled brown-haired boy, who looked down at baby Octavia and said solemnly, “I won’t let anything bad happen to you, Octavia. I promise.”

***

Levitt watched, transfixed, as the A.L.I.E’s hold on her people snapped and the man he now knew was Thelonious Jaha fell to the ground. Emori and Murphy hurtled to each other, gripping each other tight. He didn’t even have time to feel happy for them as he saw who now approached Octavia. He held his breath as Pike opened his mouth to say something to her before she punched her sword directly through his gut.

“Yes!” Levitt exclaimed without thinking. Behind him Octavia gasped, a tear trickling down her cheek and he cursed himself, embarrassed. He turned to look at her. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s just …” he searched for the right words. “You’re amazing.”

“I’m a killer. Nothing more.”

He shook his head. “That’s not true.”

“What the hell do you know?” She breathed.

He took of the glasses and came to her side. “I just spent three days in your head.” Three days, watching her grow from a child to whatever the girl in the mind channel was now. He’d watched Pike put a bullet through Lincoln’s brain, watched his blood fall to the floor like brightest rubies. He’s watched her face harden into a mask of lethal rage and hatred as his blood spread scarlet through the filthy water. He’d seen what she became afterwards. “Maybe you lost your way somewhere, but you’ve sacrificed so much for the people you love, even as a child forced to hide under the floor. You were terrified, but you ever made a sound because you knew that if they found you they’d punish Bellamy and kill your mother.” He paused. “You’re not a killer, Octavia,” he said, needing her to hear the truth in his words. “You’re a warrior to be sure, but your heart is pure.”

She closed her eyes, then opened them again. “Wait ‘til you meet Bloodriena,” was all she said.

He blinked, glancing around. _Bloodreina._ He’d heard that name a few times now, but he shoved his curiosity down. “First let’s get back to Clarke.” It was her that Anders was interested in, her and the A.I had gone into her head that day. Of course, nobody had told Levitt why, and he’d learned a long time ago not to ask questions if he wanted to keep his job. And he wanted to keep his job now more than ever. “And her journey that day. Did she survive the City of Light?”

“Why are you so interested in Clarke?”

He was about to reply when the door slid open to reveal a disciple standing there, the uniformed helmet covering their face. Levitt glanced up. “Our times not up yet, Anders can wait,” he said. He turned to smile at Octavia. “And if not, he can go float himself.”

A flash of movement and then the disciple had grabbed him, their blade pressed against his throat. Levitt froze, gasping for breath.

“Get her out of that chair,” the disciple who wasn’t a disciple growled, digging the knife into the sensitive skin under his throat. “Now!”

Levitt obeyed, his heart pounding. Who was this girl? How had she gotten in? The headpiece snapped away from Octavia, but the disciple didn’t loosen her hold on him.

“Diyoza,” she said. Her voice was heavy with exhaustion. _Diyoza._ That was who they’d found with her on Penance. Hope’s mother, but that was all he knew. He had yet to see what role she played in Octavia’s story. Somehow she must have managed to get free and find out where her friend was being kept and fought her way over to her. But how? After Octavia’s stunt the day she arrived, security had been tightened.

“What were you doing to her?” Diyoza demanded, spinning to face him.

“Diyoza, no. We need him.” Octavia struggled to get up, shoving herself up onto her elbows. Even though memory capture wasn’t painful unless you fought it, it was still draining. “He’s going to help us save Hope.”

Levitt’s gaze darted from the disciple to Octavia then to the knife that was still only inched away from slitting his throat. The moment seemed to stretch on for an eternity, but then the blade retracted, and he staggered away.

“We need him,” Octavia said again.

He watched as the disciple took of her helmet and Octavia’s brows crinkled together in confusion and she blinked. Apparently not Diyoza, then.

“It’s you,” the girl whispered, her voice shaking slightly, a far cry from the killer that had almost cut his throat moments before. She knelt in front of Octavia, staring up into her face. “Aunty O, it’s me.” Her voice broke.

Octavia’s eyes didn’t leave the newcomer, even as realisation dawned on her features. Slowly she reached out to touch the other girl’s face. “Hope,” she breathed.

Hope’s face crumpled as she sobbed, nodding. For a moment they just stared at each other, like they were drinking each other in. So this was the little girl Octavia had begged him to help her save, now grown up.

He hated to interrupt their reunion, but they had more pressing concerns. “You shouldn’t be here.”

She whirled on him, the killer snapping back into place as she demanded, “Where is my mother?”

Levitt saw with a start that the symbols etched on her face were the same as the ones on his own. _What?_ Had the girl somehow persuaded one of the disciples to turn on their own? But no, that couldn’t be. Honour was the strictest code among their ranks. Honour, obedience … that was what made them.

All that made them if he felt like being honest. They’d been trained from a young age not to form “unhealthy” or “close” relationships with anyone, as they were considered a weakness. The cause had to come first. They had no family, no friends.

But Levitt though about Octavia and Lincoln, of Octavia holding their healer at knifepoint as she marched into a fully armed grounder village without hesitation to get him back. _Get outside. Ai laik Octavia kom Skaikru, and you have something I want._ Of Bellamy Blake, who came to the ground for his sister, and again and again did the impossible to keep her safe, firmly putting her above everything else in the world. He knew without having to think about it that nobody would ever do any of that for him. And what they had … was it really such weakness?

He opened his mouth then closed it again, glancing from Hope to the door to Octavia.

“Take us to her,” Octavia said, trying to push herself out of the sitting position, but she fell back, gasping in pain.

“Hey, no no no, not you, you can hardly stand,” Hope said, rushing back to her side, and putting her hand on her shoulder. “I’m gonna send you home, and then I’m gonna go get mom.” She took Octavia’s hand and turned her stony eyes on him. “The stone rooms on the way to the cell block. If anyone asks, we’re escorting the prisoner back to her cell. You say one word other than that and I will cut your throat, do you understand?”

Levitt swallowed, nodding. The fearless authority in her voice made him remember who had raised her. He looked between them again, wishing he’s seen more of her memories so he could see how Hope fitted into her story.

 _You can’t save someone who’s already dead_. But Octavia didn’t look dead, not anymore. Maybe her time with the little girl was why.

***

Levitt walked through the long corridors he’s passed through a thousand times, his heart pounding. What if they were caught? Hope helped Octavia along behind him, the anonymous helmet once again covering her face.

Hope pressed her palm – clad in the dark glove that came with the disciple armour/uniform – against the panel, and the sliding door slid open, revealing the empty chamber, the stone hovering in the middle. She shoved him forwards and the door shut behind them.

“You triggered a bio-hazard to keep people away,” he said, glancing around, noting the beeping alarm and lack of disciples or guards. “Clever.”

“It wasn’t my idea,” Hope said, letting go of Octavia and tugging off the helmet again to look around.

 _Oh._ That explained everything. The markings on her face, her knowledge of the compound … “Safe to assume the retrieval team for whoever helped you isn’t coming back?”

“Yeah.”

He opened the hidden compartment in the wall, tugging out the lens and flicking the red and blue glass into place, not giving himself time to contemplate what he was doing. The betrayal he was making. But to help Octavia … well it was an easy enough decision to make. “Then you know we have thirty minutes until we send another.”

“Yep,” she said over her shoulder. “Dev knew everything.” She marched over to the anomaly stone, putting the helmet back on. “Show me the star map.”

I looked over to where Octavia was standing against the wall, to weak to support herself on her own.

“You’re shivering,” Levitt noticed, opening up another compartment and pulling out her old jacket, although it was hardly more than a rag of leather and cloth.

“I said, show me the star map,” Hope repeated from behind him, swiping her hand in front of her helmet, trying to activate it. He ignored her.

“I believe this is yours,” he said, and Octavia took her jacket with a grateful not. He tried to ignore the brief feel of her skin against his as he smiled.

“Somethings wrong,” Hope said, and he turned, frowning. “Dev said all I had to do was think it.”

He strode over to her, feeling the weight of Octavia’s gaze on him the entire way. “Sanctum, I presume?” he asked, pressing his hands to the symbols to activate it.

“Yes.”

“Unlike Dev, I actually do know everything.” He continued to touch the symbols that he knew by heart. “I hope you weren’t in trouble when you left,” he added over his shoulder to Octavia. “Thanks to time dilation, despite the years you spent on Skyring and the length of your stay here, you’ll be returning at almost exactly the same time.” His hand hovered over the last symbol. “Soon as I touch this, the bridge will open, and people will know.” He inclined his head to Hope. “Give her your helmet.”

She blinked. “What – why?”

“So she doesn’t lose her memory,” he said as if it was obvious. Both girls stared at him blankly. “It’s a side affect of jumping to a slower time dilated planet. She’ll forget everything from the moment she left to the moment she returns.” He paused. “She’ll forget you.” _And me,_ he didn’t add. _I don’t want you to forget me. Because I wont ever forget you._

“But I need the helmet to ghost.” Hope looked frantic. “Without it, I – I can’t get mom.”

Something in Octavia’s face changed. “Even with the helmet you could still get caught, and I won’t be able to help you.” There was something distinctly _parent_ about her voice.

There was a beat of silence. Levitt’s mind raced through years of training, trying to think of something, anything, that could get them out of there with memories intact. He held up a hand. “Wait,” he said, turning and striding back over to the hidden compartment. “I have an idea.” He pulled out a pale gold rod about the length of his arm and the small tablet that activated it. It thrummed with power under his grasp. “The native Bardoans used it to pull people back who got stuck in the bridge. Lets hope it still works …”

He activated with his thumb print and held it out in front of Hope as the light in the top began to glow pale blue. “Look here and try not to blink. The eyes are the windows to the soul,” he said as it scanned her pupils. “Every mind has it’s unique code, and with it,” he jerked his head towards the anomaly stone, “that stone can find you.”

The light flashed off and he smiled, taking in her surprised face. “That’s you.” The spiral of symbols – her code – flickered to life on the tablet. He headed over to where Octavia was still leaning against the wall, trying to memorise her face during what might possibly be the last moments he ever saw her. “You can enter her code into the stone there, it’ll pull her across the bridge remotely. You won’t remember each other, but at least you’ll be alive.” Levitt was alive with adrenaline, his breathing fast. “Turn around,” he said. Octavia looked at him blankly, her eyes flickering from the rod in his hand to his face to Hope. “We need to tattoo her code onto your back.”

“If you’re right, she won’t remember what it means,” Hope pointed out.

“One problem at a time, okay, we have to do this now,” he said urgently. Octavia nodded, handing her jacket to Hope, turning around, and tugging up the back of her shirt, wincing at the movement. “Easy,” Levitt murmured.

“What if she doesn’t see it?” Hope asked, as he carefully ran the rod down her back, leaving the symbols in its wake.

“It’s the only place big enough. Believe it or not, it used to fit on the Bardoans arm – success rate’s a little dodgy though. Eight out of ten times its safe, but the other two times … well, not so much. It’s why we stopped using it.” He tried not to think about that, but he’d seen her operate on much worse odds than this. Eighty percent would have seemed like a blessing to her growing up under the floor. He finished the symbols. “There. Done.”

Hope helped her tug her shirt back down and she turned to look up at him. Octavia put her hand on her heart. “Thank you.”

Levitt smiled breathlessly. “Of course.” He didn’t see the blow coming, and so he was taken entirely unaware as her fist slammed into his cheekbone. He went reeling backwards, clutching his face. He stared up at her in shock.

“For your own good,” she said. “It can’t look like you helped us.” He nodded as best he could with pain splintering through his head. She hit him again and he went sprawling onto his back. The ceiling was spinning so he shut his eyes. She threw a very good punch.

When he opened them again a second later she was looking down at him, a half smile on her face. Real gratitude shone in her eyes, though, and he was glad that he could help her even just a bit. “May we meet again.”

Levitt didn’t care that he was lying flat on his back and grinning like a fool as he replied, “May we meet again.” The Skaikru goodbye felt so natural to say, so easy. For a moment they just stared at each other, and then Hope was there, wrapping her jacket around her shoulders and guiding her towards the anomaly stone.

“Levitt, open the bridge,” she ordered.

He really would miss her, her realised. He’d never met anyone like her before. But … she had a life to go back to. He couldn’t keep her here, not when all her loved ones were in danger on the other side of the anomaly. Bellamy, Indra, even Clarke and Madi … they needed her, and she needed them. He had to let her go.

He peeled himself of the floor, rubbing his already bruising face. “On it.”

He pressed that last symbol and green light filled the room as the bridge opened, swirling around the stone.

Octavia and Hope’s foreheads were pressed together, and they were whispering words that Levitt chose not to hear. It was none of his business, and he hated to interrupt their goodbyes, but -

“Octavia,” he said. “You need to go.” The other disciples would be here soon, and what they’d do to her if they found her …

“I love you, little one. Don’t you ever forget it.” Octavia kissed Hope’s forehead and then stepped away, meeting his eyes one last time as she stepped back through the curtain of green light, and vanished.

Light filled the room and somewhere in the distance and alarm began to blare. _Shit._

“You’ll never make it, you have to go too -”

“I have to try.” Hope strode past him, scooping up her helmet.

“Hope you don’t understand, they’ll have helmets too, they’ll -” She vanished, leaving him alone, staring at the where Octavia had disappeared through the bridge had moments before.

He wouldn’t forget her, he swore silently. He’d keep fighting for her, and for Hope, because she was important to her and therefor important to him.

Voices sounded down the hall and Levitt took of running back to M-cap, his head swirling with memories that weren’t his own.

***

He hadn’t found out that Hope had been caught until it was too late. Anders ordered him to look through her memories and he did, but there was nothing of interest there about the key – about Clarke. And so Levitt had tried to get her away, safely back to Sanctum, but after Octavia’s escape they were both being watched too closely. He’d tried, but he failed to gather any information about where Diyoza was being kept either.

When he entered M-cap the next day to find her gone, he assumed that she’d been moved to one of the holding cells. He was told nothing of the mission they forced her to undertake, and although he was worried, he went about completing his regular duties as normal. He’d done everything he could for Hope now.

But every time he closed his eyes, he saw her. Octavia.

Sometimes she was laughing, galloping through a grassy meadow on a chestnut horse, a rover clattering along next to her. _“Try keep up!”_

Sometimes she was armed to the teeth, cutting down trained warriors like they were nothing, gore splattering her arms and face and nothing human in her voice as she snarled, _“You are Wonkru or you are the enemy of Wonkru.”_

Sometimes he saw Bellamy, or Clarke or Jasper or Lincoln, flashes and snapshots of those people she had loved and lost so fiercely.

He was grateful, he realised. Grateful that he’d met her, grateful that he’d seen another way to live.

He hoped she was safe now, or as safe as a girl who lived like she did ever was. Even if she had no recollection of him even existing, even if he never saw her again, he hoped she was safe and never came into contact with Bardo or it’s disciples again.

So when that next afternoon she was dragged into M-cap by Anders, a stab wound in her side freshly bandaged, his heart nearly stopped dead in his chest. For him, only five days had pasted but for her it had clearly been longer.

He stared numbly at Anders as he deposited the unconscious Octavia in the chair, a roaring filling his ears, drowning out his boss’s orders. A satisfied smile coiled on Anders’ pale face at the Shepard’s bidding well done. “She’ll wake soon. We were forced to give her a sedative, she didn’t come easy.” _I expect not,_ Levitt thought proudly. Without another look at either of them Anders turned and strode out of the room.

Slowly, as if his brain were lagging like an old computer, the rest of what Anders had said sank in. _No. No._ That was what he’d been dreading from the moment all those days ago when she finally let him in.

He turned away from the door at last and rushed over to Octavia. If he was correct about what sedative they had used it would be an hour or more before she woke up. The time slid past quickly as he set about sorting through his equipment, making sure all of the reports were in the right places. When he’d double and triple checked everything he could think of, he returned to her side.

“Octavia?” Her eyelashes fluttered but she didn’t wake. He touched her tattooed arm lightly, pulling his hand back as her eyes struggled open and she stared up at him. “Octavia!” She sat up, her dark hair falling back from her face as she took in the familiar room. Her memories would have some flooding back from the moment she arrived back in Bardo.

“I’m so sorry this happened to you. I did everything I could to help Hope, including surgically implanting a message in her arm.” He spoke quickly, the words tumbling out. “I’m sorry to say that this will be our last session.”

“Why?”

“They’re taking me of your case, I think they think I’ve gotten too close.” The words were bitter on his tongue as Octavia twisted to look at the door, as if she could see right through it to the pale haired man who Levitt was well aware had had a target on his back from the moment he’d dragged her and Diyoza away from their home and child on Skyring. But she would wait, though. Octavia was a lot of things, but she wasn’t impulsive, not anymore. “Listen to me,” he said, drawing her attention back to him, “whoever takes your place, you can’t fight them, your brain will haemorrhage, but you can beat the machine if you keep your mind focused on a single thought, a mantra, like your mom had you say under the floor.”

Octavia nodded. “I am not afraid.”

Levitt thanked the Shepard that Octavia wasn’t easily overwhelmed. “Yes, good, okay, let’s try it -”

The buzz of the door being opened sounded, and he quickly stepped away from Octavia and turned to face it, just as Anders strode in, flanked on either side by desciples.

“Can I help you, sir?”

“Her brother is here,” Anders said. Octavia’s eyes widened, and a ripple of silence went through the room. “I need her to talk him down.” Two disciples grabbed Octavia by each arm and hoisted her out of the M-cap chair. “No one else has to die.”

He turned and left, the disciples holding Octavia between them, as much to keep her upright as it was to stop her from running. Since no one told him not to, Levitt rushed after them.

***

“Hey, big brother,” Octavia said, raising her hand in greeting to the young man standing in front of the anomaly stone, the bodies of three disciples sprawled at his feet. He tightened his grip on the white clad conductor, the point of the bloody knife digging into his throat.

“Let her go,” Bellamy ordered, in a voice that Levitt recognised, echoing back from thousands of Octavia’s memories. He knew enough about him to know that it wasn’t at all unlike Bellamy to be cornered in a room full of powerful killers and to still be making demands for his sister’s life. He also knew that this wasn’t the most precarious situation Bellamy had been in – not even close. And that both Blake’s were probably the most practiced killers out of them all. Levitt had enough sense to be nervous, his gaze darting between them. “Right now.”

“We can’t do that,” Anders said, calm as ever, making his way towards him. “These good men who you killed brought you here from Sanctum for a reason.” Of course. Because who knew more about Clarke than Bellamy did? “Let the conductor go, and then we can talk.”

Bellamy didn’t move. “Her first.”

“There’s no other way out of this for you, Mr Blake.”

“Bell, he’s right,” Octavia said from where she was pinned between the two disciples. Normally they’d be dead before they could so much as unsheathe the hidden knives that were built into the armour, but Octavia was wounded and still drained from memory capture. Her eyes flicked from her brother to Anders. “Open the bridge, and send him back to Sanctum. I’ll tell you everything you wanna know – even about Clarke.”

He saw the words register with Anders, even as Bellamy demanded, “What the hell are you talking about?” Right, because one of the first things he’d figured out from Octavia’s memories was that Bellamy did not take well to people threatening Clarke Griffin.

Anders ignored him, his face carefully blank as he approached the anomaly stone. Levitt’s heart was pounding, but he didn’t intervene. Would he have time perhaps to shove Octavia through the bridge after him, then leap through himself? Or would that just lose him any jurisdiction he had left over Octavia’s fate?

“No,” the conductor said. “Sir, you can’t –”

“Shut up,” Bellamy barked, pressing the knife in harder.

“Bell, it’s okay,” said Octavia. “I can’t let you die to save me.” The glowing green light filled the room as Anders opened up the bridge. Bellamy looked from the swirling green light to Octavia and back. “Jump through,” she said. “I’ll be okay.”

Knowing what he did about Bellamy Blake, Levitt wasn’t at all surprised to hear him say, “No way.” And then more forcefully, “Not without you.”

From the floor at Bellamy’s feet, one of the wounded disciples that Levitt had dismissed as dead gasped out, “I do the Shepard’s bidding. For all mankind.”

There was a click, and Levitt realised what was going to happen a fraction of a second before Octavia screamed, “ _BELLAMY, GET DOWN!_ ”

But it was too late. Blinding light filled the chamber as the explosion blasted them backwards, and when it faded all that was left was a ringing in his ears, and in front of him – nothing. There was nothing left of Bellamy or the disciples, only the anomaly stone, as untouched as ever.

“There’s been an explosion in the stone-room,” someone was saying, but it sounded like it was coming from a million miles away. “I repeat, there’s an explosion in the stone room."

But Levitt wasn’t listening as he hurtled to where Octavia was sitting up, dropping to his knees behind her. A faint splattering of blood covering her features. She just sat and stared and stared and stared, her hands reaching up to touch her ears, and then she started screaming.

He couldn’t hear what she was saying over the ringing in his ears, but he knew what it was anyway: A name, over and over.

_“BELLAMY!”_

Levitt knew he was saying something too as he tried to pull her away, his hand against the bare skin of her arm, but she didn’t move as she kept screaming, like her world had just been blasted apart as surely as the boy in front of them had been.

**Author's Note:**

> I know Bellamy isn't actually dead lol if I do a part two maybe I'll include them finding out he's alive


End file.
